How I get inspired to create a new series of paintings

I shall be starting a new series of paintings in the studio during January. I thought it would be interesting to show what has inspired this series and how I but together my initial ideas and get started.

I was delighted to receive a wonderful book for Christmas and spent time over the holidays immersing myself in the artists and how they approached still life. As you will have seen if you follow me on Instagram I have recently been to Charleston House and have been inspired by the work of the Bloomsbury Group. I wanted to develop this warm earthy palette further for this next series of paintings so my starting point has been to create a colour and inspiration board around colour.

How I create a inspiration board?

I love creating a scrapbook, full of images I collect from magazines, postcards, photographs and cuttings. An inspiration board is very similar for me just a bit larger. I start with at least an A2 or A1 piece of paper and onto this I collage cuttings, images from magazines, examples of colours, paintings I like until I get an feel for a direction to take my paintings. This is then stuck to my studio wall and gets added to as I start the series of paintings.

My current inspiration board

I spent quite a lot of time looking at my board and identify what are the key areas, I often scribble notes or add post its so I remember what I want to add and include in my paintings. For this series I have identified :

Earthy tones, mid-century ceramics, translucent underpainting in burnt sienna, cast shadows…

In my next blog find out how this series of work developed!